This whole episode would be funny if it weren't for the fact that everyone was well-intentioned... Kerry wanted a tour of the shuttle, NASA wanted to keep the orbiter clean, and the NASA photographers were just doing their routine.

yup, everyone was well intentioned... but of course that everyone does not include the media who got their hands on the photos afterwards... so this is what happens. i do feel bad for the guy though. i know that if i had the chance to get a tour of the shuttle, i would definitely have jumped into that suit as well!

This whole episode would be funny if it weren't for the fact that everyone was well-intentioned... Kerry wanted a tour of the shuttle, NASA wanted to keep the orbiter clean, and the NASA photographers were just doing their routine.

You know, I'd like a tour of a shuttle as well, preferably all of them, in a museum, in 6 months. I'll even volunteer to sawz-all some tourist access ports through all of them to hurry up the process, just like the 2nd skylab station in the Smithsonian.

I've been in Pathfinder I believe, but I just don't want to see another dime spent on the Shuttles. I really think it's well past time they were retired and I'm sure there'd be plenty of volunteers to convert the remaining shuttles into museum displays.

There would definitely be plenty of volunteers. Just about everyone in this forum would jump at the chance to:

1) See the shuttles retired

and

2) Be part of a program that will eventually help the population get a glimpse of what it was like in the shuttles and maybe motivate them about space a little more.

You forgot

3) Show NASA how it damned well oughta be done: an aerospike-based SSTO RLV that can transport cargo and passengers to an orbital station relatively cheaply and make a profit doing it. I'm thinking along the lines of the X-33, I believe it was: the ugly wedge-shaped vehicle.